Greg considers himself a private person, yet through his daily Web log, he reveals to the world his deeply personal struggle to cope with the death of his wife.

"It's been 293 days since life without Cheryl began. I miss her leaving the toothpaste uncapped."

In another corner of the Internet, a man whose online persona is MetroDad admits that since his daughter was born, he cries "at the drop of a hat."

"I'm a withering willow of whimpering wussiness. ... I don't know what's come over me. I started crying tears of joy at the birth of my daughter 14 weeks ago, and I haven't stopped since ... I can't even have cereal in the morning because I can't stand looking at the missing kids on the side of the milk carton."

The rise of easy-to-use software to create Web logs -- better-known as blogs -- has spawned millions of blogs, whose topics are as diverse as the people who write them.

But some of the most moving and engaging blogs are the ones that share the kind of intensely personal joys and sorrows that might otherwise have been locked away in a private diary or deep in someone's heart.

For bloggers, going online gives them a therapeutic lifeline to friends and strangers.

"For me, it's cheaper than therapy, even with good Web hosting," said Greg Hammond, 49, the Lafayette man whose blog, California Hammonds (californiaham monds.com), chronicles how he is coming to grips with the loss of his wife, Cheryl, who died of breast cancer in April at the age of 36.

"There's a risk-reward you get with putting yourself out there," said New York resident Pierre Kim, 36, who as MetroDad (metro dad.typepad.com), attracts about 2,000 visitors per day. "The reward is you find people who are going through the exact same thing as you and in many cases at the exact same time as you. It encourages you because you find out you're not alone."

These personal blogs are the information-age equivalent of what humans have been doing for millennia, sharing their own unique lives with each other, said San Francisco's Rebecca Blood, a noted blogging expert.

"People have always told each other stories, in a cave around a fire thousands of years ago, in the marketplace in the Middle Ages, around the water cooler at the office," said Blood, author of "The Weblog Handbook." "This is basic human activity that has been transferred to the Web."

Like a good soap opera or reality TV show, the most compelling personal blogs get readers to keep coming back for more.

"When you start reading someone's personal site, it's really hard not to get invested in that person's life," Blood said. "You start to become interested in what happens next in their story."

Call it Reality Internet. For one man who calls his blog Brainhell (brainhell.blogspot.com), reality is the progression of a usually fatal condition, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease. He started the blog shortly before learning of the diagnosis one year ago, to keep his immediate circle of family and friends updated, but now it gets about 50 visitors per day.

"When I awake in bed I stretch, often with a yawn. It's involuntary, you probably do it too, and normally it's a healthy thing. However, for me, it usually results in a cramp, and a feeling of damage to my muscles. I conjecture that this is the major way my leg muscles deteriorate. I don't dwell on the negative, but I imagine that if some day I am unable to get out of bed and stand up, this will be the reason. Posted by Brainhell 7:38 am."

Brainhell, like many bloggers, goes to great lengths to keep his real identity private, preferring to shield himself behind the anonymity the Internet can afford, yet still reach out to the public. Brainhell asked that he be identified only as a California resident.

"I went public because I wanted to be there in case other people diagnosed with ALS searched for a blog about having the disorder," Brainhell wrote in an e-mail to The Chronicle. "I had searched and found data, but not daily personal accounts. And I had faith that strangers would bring me useful information and support, which they have."

On the blog Chez Miscarriage (chezmiscarriage.blogs.com/chezmiscarriage), a woman who goes by the name Getupgrrl mixes pathos with biting humor to update readers on her attempts to have a child. She has had four miscarriages in four years and two failed attempts at in vitro fertilization. Getupgrrl now has a surrogate mother who had been carrying twins, but regular readers learned of a shocking setback in her Jan. 14 update.

"We lost one of the twins. It was an accident, the doctor explained to us, a fluke of implantation. A random stroke of misfortune. Just one of those things, the kind of thing that happens during pregnancy."

Three days later, Getupgrrl was searching for meaning.

"What I wanted from this journey -- what I still want, even now -- is for it to have meaning, some kind of value. I want it to make me a better human being. I don't believe that 'things happen for a reason,' that there's a specific, mystical purpose underlying every random accident and heartbreak. But I do believe that heartbreak can be infused with purpose, that we can choose to give it meaning. On my better days, I think that's what it means to be alive -- to create a coherent arc of meaning out of the seemingly disparate, and occasionally tragic, events of our lives."

In an e-mail, Getupgrrl said that her blog has been instrumental in helping her cope. During one particular crisis in July, "my readers were the only reason I was getting out of bed," she said.

For some, blogging is a chance to vent. UCLA student Brian Tanada, for example, has been commenting on dating (livejour nal.com/users/bri2kand1).

"So here I sit. Officially neutered male. No, definitely not in a physical sense. Just in a total emotional sense. I am a nice guy. No doubt. However, just because I'm a nice guy, I don't like having my niceness taken advantage of. I'm starting to get annoyed by the influx of girls seeking relationship advice from myself. I'm not an emotional crutch to be discarded once you're happy and healed. Jan. 16th, 2005 @ 05:37 pm."

Tanada, 21, said his blog "allows me to express whatever is on my mind without having to censor myself. It's an outlet that I can use whenever I feel, even at 4 a.m. It helps to calm me down if I'm stressed, mad or depressed. I can be sad, I can be happy, I can be goofy. I can even mix them all together. It's a way for me to sort out my life when it gets confusing at times or write about trivial thoughts that humor me."

Hammond, whose site includes a memorial photo gallery of his wife, said bloggers read other blogs, which in turn creates a self-sustaining state of sentience not found offline. Hammond now gets up to 1,000 daily visits to his blog. It was voted most inspirational in one Web site's vote for Best of Blog Awards for 2004, and it recently raised $3,000 for breast cancer research.

But Hammond didn't start the blog in 2000 to win awards, raise money or gain an audience. "I wanted an easier way for friends and extended family members to know what was happening with my wife's illness," he said. "I write mostly for me."

The fact that he allows his private thoughts to become public is "the conundrum that I cannot explain. It's easier to talk to strangers about things than it is to talk to people you know."

But he hopes his blog comforts those who find themselves in similar circumstances or helps people gain a new perspective about their own loved ones.

"A lifetime ago. That's how long it's been since the last time I spent New Year's Eve and Day without my wife. I wish I could hold back the clock, not let the calendar turn, stay in something like the present where my wife is still here somehow, because every date with an 05 behind it means she wasn't there, won't be there, ever. Posted by Greg at 09:17 PM."

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